July 8, 2025: annals of democratic renewal

I like Bowinn Ma a lot. She is the British Columbia Member of the Legislative Assembly representing North Vancouver-Lonsdale. She’s a good person, attuned to local urban needs, and has all the right approaches to policy making. in her second term, she is now the Minister of Infrastructure, a perfect job for an engineer with an abiding interest in how people move around well. She has recently been the champion of some legislation that I vehemently disagree with, but that’s politics. On June 27, her constituency office was bombed at 4:15 in the morning. It was a small device that went off. It happened a week after Minnesota state speaker Melissa Hortman and her husband were assassinated, and another left wing Minnesota state senator was also shot. I have not heard any ongoing conversation in my circles about the fact that one of our MLAs had her office bombed during a time of political violence in North America. This strikes me as NOT OKAY.

Barak Obama spent an hour talking to Heather Cox Richardson, during which he dropped this line that “the system has been captured by this with a weak attachment to democracy.” Here’s the clip. Here’s the full interview. I appreciation Richardson’s commitment to the grass roots, but it’s not just the case that bottom up is the only way we make change. Bottom up vs top down is not a moral position. Bombing an MLA’s office and assassinating democratically elected representatives is also “bottom-up” change making. Democracy moves very slowly, which is its feature. But the public square has developed incredible potential to reinvigorate that, except that the tools of democratic engagement and grass roots conversation have alos been captured by “those with a weak attachment to democracy.” I don’t have answers, and Obama’s ideas sound old now, but in essence, I don’t know what other choice we have. We are quickly losing the ability to deliberate together, and that is the essence of democracy.

The guy who inspires me the most in this space of democratic renewal these days is Peter Levine, whose work I often share. Here he is in conversation with Nathaniel G. Perlman on The Great Battlefield podcast. He recently shared work on trust in institutions from CIRCLE which studies youth engagement in civic life. There are some good lessons in here for people working to keep robust democratic engagement alive, and especially making the generational hand off. I’m of the mind that one way to generate trust from citizens in democratic institutions is to bootstrap it by institutional leaders working from a basic stance of trust in citizens. The CIRCLE study is important work. If you work in a democratic institution, including education, media, government, and other organizations essential to a functioning pluralistic society, it’s a must read.

Community Foundations are a powerful group of civic institutions in this country. I have worked with many, including my own local one here on Bowen Island, and the Vancouver Foundation, the largest in Canada. Their work is important, influential and essential, especially as we enter a new period of austerity. A story this past week surfaced on how community foundations in Canada are working to support local journalism so that news on local issues can be properly covered. As a person who lives in a community with a great local newspaper, this is fantastic to see.